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The Swans of Fifth Avenue A Novel Melanie Benjamin Books

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The Swans of Fifth Avenue A Novel Melanie Benjamin Books

When Truman Capote published La Cote Basque 1965 (in 1975), it was much to the embarrassment and shame of a top tier group of NY Society women, formerly referred to by Truman Capote as his "Swans." The Swans were comprised of Barbara Paley, Slim Keith, C.Z. Guest, Maria Agnelli and Gloria Guinness (and several others). For a few decades – the 1950s to the 1970s – these were the "IT" girls. You didn't mess with them. That is, unless you were Truman Capote on booze and drugs. There is a Vanity Fair article entitled, Bye Society, by Gerald Clarke, from 1988 that one can read online – just google it – that is very informative as this story goes.

For many years, Truman Capote ingratiated himself into the lives of these women, who loved and adored him and who trusted him with all of their many secrets and private circumstances. His later downward spiral following years of obsessive focus on In Cold Blood, a time that included enough alcohol and drugs to choke a horse, resulted in his somewhat unethical betrayal of the Swans right there on the pages of Esquire, for all the world to see.

Truman was especially close to Barbara "Babe" Paley, the glamorous wife of CBS executive, Bill Paley, and much of this novel has to do with this central relationship. In a way, Truman and Babe were soulmate friends who sincerely adored and understood each other's frailties. Truman was welcomed into Babe's life as well as the other ladies' lives, complete with a constant flow of invitations to their magnificent houses and yachts and gifts of extravagant luxuries. Even as a relatively young and unknown writer, he was accepted into influential circles, meeting people and celebrities he wouldn't have otherwise.

As his fame grew and his talent recognized, he changed. And not for the better. With an overindulgence of drugs and drink, he became unable to focus on another book the magnitude of In Cold Blood. Instead, he penned La Cote Basque 1965 (in 1975) and betrayed his beloved Babe and the rest of the Swans. The results were quite shattering for most of the group. As the Vanity Fair article states, he committed Social Suicide. Big time.

This novel is based on facts but does fill in some of the blanks with literary fiction, which includes a sufficient amount of juicy, catty, backstabbing dialogue. We learn a lot about Truman's personal life, his mother issues, his longing for fame and notoriety and his downward spiral into that Social Suicide. The funny thing is that when you think about this type of thing in today's media environment, the fallout would be minimal. Back then it was devastating.

I read this back to back with a small book of Truman Capote's early stories that is just being released. It was a nice companion, thinking about Truman's relationships and lifestyle.

Well written and researched.

Recommend.


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The Swans of Fifth Avenue A Novel Melanie Benjamin Books Reviews

Truman Capote remains a perpetual person of interest for me. This book comes as the second book from his friend Harper Lee has been published reopening the spotlight on the character Dill based on his childhood. Whether this is simply coincidence I could not say. It is interesting that Nell Lee was known to have struggled reply with this second book and was thought for years to have failed to produce one. Truman famously redefined the form of the non fiction history developing the story and characters of the murderers as a significant part of the book. His labor involved a close relationship with one of the men and a subsequent ambivalence awaiting the execution so that his book could be published.
He never recovered his persona, his character or his work after the acclaim that met the publication.

Along the way he was supported by "Swans of Fifth Avenue". This novel is based on the extraordinary, wealthy and multifaceted women friends who admitted him to "her world , a world of quiet elegance, artifice, presentation". He was already well known for such words as "Breakfast at Tiffany's". He lived within the world of these women, often lonely, thrilled to be patrons of Capote.

As the histories and private miseries of his swans and of Truman develop, a tragedy of hubris unfolds that intrigues the reader and provides that all so important "rich porn" of those who live a different life.
Some readers will have little interest in these characters and their world, floating like whipped cream on top of the Fifties and Sixties. The complex of relationships between Truman Capote and his "swans" (wealthy, socially powerful, gorgeous society women Babe Paley and her sisters, Slim Keith, CZ Guest, Gloria Guinness, Marella Agnelli, Carol Matthau, Gloria Vanderbilt, Pamela Digby Churchill Heyward Harriman and others); and their husbands, esp Bill Paley, is here treated in a "non-fiction novel", a literary form Capote claimed to invent, and used to impressive effect in his masterpiece, In Cold Blood.

Benjamin is not a stylist at Capote's level, but she writes well. (I should mention that i listened to an audible version instead of reading print.) She brings to life the emotional activity behind all that luxurious beauty and social perfection - she is esp good with Capote, Babe Paley, Slim Keith, and Bill Paley, our principle players.

I was already familiar with many of these stories, esp Capote's triumph and fall, and the aftermath of the story La Cote Basque, 1965. Many other reviewers have given vivid intros.
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For me, the weakest points are

The symbolic bookends at the beginning and end, happily brief.

The dialogue at the imagined "swan power lunch" after the Esquire publication, which seems somewhat weak.

The re-working of who might have left the stains on those sheets. While Benjamin's version has some poignancy, Benjamin's choice, who cared deeply for Babe, would never have behaved so - and this version undercuts the point of Truman's story the deliberate insult the old-money, un-swan-like WASP wife intended to wield as she conveyed her contempt for the Jewish mogul who dared to believe himself in her league.
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The best parts are the voices of Truman, Babe, Bill, and Slim, who come to life. They grew on me until they felt fully formed. The writer makes real the fragile trust Truman and Babe hold in each other, until he goes too far.

I wish someone would publish depth biographies of these swans and their world, and i would also love a photographic history. We can be nostalgic because this world is as lost as Fitzgerald's hopes and dreams, as given to Gatzby. These socialites already seemed quaint and "as seen through a glass" in the seventies, and Amanda Burden, Babe Paley's daughter, has chosen and succeeded at a very different and modern sort of life.

Curously the most successful of these swans, in the terms of today's worldviews, are Pamela Harriman, "the courtesan of the century", the least swan-like, who transformed herself into a real power with a notable career; CZ Guest, gardening expert, and to appearances the least fragile, most confident and emotionally whole of this group, and the one who stayed in touch with Capote; Gloria Vanderbilt, survivor of a horrible childhood, who re-invented herself as a notable businesswoman.

I started this expecting a "beach read" and found much more.

Note
Among the swans I mention, I give all the various names only of Pamela Harriman. This is not intended as catty. Pamela, sometimes called "the courtesan if the century", used her family heritage, aristocratic birth, husbands, membership in the Churchill family, lovers, connections, and shrewdness to create a unique and not always admirable life story. She seemed to live decades in luxurious idleness before she came to New York and started in earnest on her career of marriage upwards and transforming her growing influence into astonishing political power. Her various biographies are worthy reading.
When Truman Capote published La Cote Basque 1965 (in 1975), it was much to the embarrassment and shame of a top tier group of NY Society women, formerly referred to by Truman Capote as his "Swans." The Swans were comprised of Barbara Paley, Slim Keith, C.Z. Guest, Maria Agnelli and Gloria Guinness (and several others). For a few decades – the 1950s to the 1970s – these were the "IT" girls. You didn't mess with them. That is, unless you were Truman Capote on booze and drugs. There is a Vanity Fair article entitled, Bye Society, by Gerald Clarke, from 1988 that one can read online – just google it – that is very informative as this story goes.

For many years, Truman Capote ingratiated himself into the lives of these women, who loved and adored him and who trusted him with all of their many secrets and private circumstances. His later downward spiral following years of obsessive focus on In Cold Blood, a time that included enough alcohol and drugs to choke a horse, resulted in his somewhat unethical betrayal of the Swans right there on the pages of Esquire, for all the world to see.

Truman was especially close to Barbara "Babe" Paley, the glamorous wife of CBS executive, Bill Paley, and much of this novel has to do with this central relationship. In a way, Truman and Babe were soulmate friends who sincerely adored and understood each other's frailties. Truman was welcomed into Babe's life as well as the other ladies' lives, complete with a constant flow of invitations to their magnificent houses and yachts and gifts of extravagant luxuries. Even as a relatively young and unknown writer, he was accepted into influential circles, meeting people and celebrities he wouldn't have otherwise.

As his fame grew and his talent recognized, he changed. And not for the better. With an overindulgence of drugs and drink, he became unable to focus on another book the magnitude of In Cold Blood. Instead, he penned La Cote Basque 1965 (in 1975) and betrayed his beloved Babe and the rest of the Swans. The results were quite shattering for most of the group. As the Vanity Fair article states, he committed Social Suicide. Big time.

This novel is based on facts but does fill in some of the blanks with literary fiction, which includes a sufficient amount of juicy, catty, backstabbing dialogue. We learn a lot about Truman's personal life, his mother issues, his longing for fame and notoriety and his downward spiral into that Social Suicide. The funny thing is that when you think about this type of thing in today's media environment, the fallout would be minimal. Back then it was devastating.

I read this back to back with a small book of Truman Capote's early stories that is just being released. It was a nice companion, thinking about Truman's relationships and lifestyle.

Well written and researched.

Recommend.